oliuk

Really enjoyed the video, nicely put together.
I think its pretty unacceptable to run out of food in the lounge when advertising this as the main meal of the service!

T8191

Although it's BA's problem at the end of the line, I do wonder what went wrong to create this issue. IME the contractor there has always been excellent, with great staff. OK, I've never bothered with pre-flight, as I take the early bird, but this is the first time I've heard of grief on FT (and I do look out for IAD comments).

Now ... we haven't got a timeline for the TR. There's no pre-flight dining in the temporary Lounge, AFAIK, and that's been operating for at least 6 months. I went through the Temp facility in June so this isn't surely current news ... and not exactly relevant to today. No disrespect to the OP at all - I appreciate that generating a TR can take time in a busy life, but the food dimension is neither 'now' nor 'future', if you see what I mean.

Perhaps NTA could tell us when this was?

NTA

This review covers a flight from before the lounge closed for expansion to accommodate the A380 service - 3 months ago - and reflects the regular, business-as-usual offering rather than the temporary arrangements you'd see if you travelled this month. The temporary arrangements (as stated above) don't include any pre-flight dining, but have a full menu onboard instead.

On our trip, the BA catering staff in Washington didn't speak English but from what I could gather they just didn't have enough food to satisfy the hunger levels of all the passengers that night (aka the passengers from the earlier flight ate more from the buffet than was internally allocated for them).

This was a night when regular pre-flight dining was advertised, hence the only food on the plane in J was two basic light meals (and we ended up getting a Y meal). If we had arrived at the airport in the early evening, we could have had a stir-fry made to order, some butter chicken, a pasta dish or poached cod. Unfortunately, these had all been eaten by the time we were there so had some soup (which I think T8191 is available to all Galleries guests, not just those eligible for pre-flight dining).

I appreciate it's wasteful to throw food away each night, but the whole sleeper service fell apart for us for want of an extra $5 in ingredients. I'd have switched our return flights to United, but they were inflexible tickets - fortunately our return BA flight was better but we still booked our next longhaul tickets on Singapore and MAS rather than BA.

Hope this clarifies T8191!
.

T8191

Thanks NTA, appreciate the extra info.

Yes, we sampled the soup on our last passage through the 'old' Lounge ... it was an utterly superb mixed mushroom soup, so loaded with with various fungi that my [small] bowl must have contained over 1/4 lb of them. And, no, I didn't scoop out the best bits - the whole tureen was like that

busylawmom

Thanks. I fly to Europe 2 or 3 times a year biz class out of dulles. I often end up stopping in the uk. I switched from united to BA because I can't bear the idea of the newish United biz class four middle seats. I also prefer changing at heathrow T5 instead of Frankfurt. I also like the sleeper service when it is actually available. United has a late night flight too but they clatter dinner and drinks so it's hard to sleep.

NTA

Updated the second post with a closer look at the double beds BA offers in the 'middle 4' seats on our return flight - or you can cheat and click here to go straight to the video.

IMHO, the double beds are the ones to pick if you're a couple.

710 77345

I don't think BA crew like having kids on the floor, but the last row provides a great space for you to put a blanket down and pen in a little one during regular flight (obviously you'd have to pick him up if the seatbelt sign comes on).

Are there any formal rules that would mean you couldn't do this?

NTA

BA has a funny 4 seat in the middle layout too, though this means you can sleep in a 'double bed' if you're travelling with a partner. If you've got a high status in OneWorld or can pay the steep reservation fees, then these seats are easy to obtain or avoid depending on your preference as long as you book a week or more out.

If you're flying overnight before work, then I don't think there's a better service than BA on this route once the sleeper service resumes. It's not glamorous or exciting, but being able to get more sleep than on rival airlines is fantastic.

I do worry that the lounge catering which failed for us in the days of 747/777s will struggle with the A380 loads, even with the lounge extension. BA are not known for going beyond the bare minimum at the moment, but I do hope I'm pleasantly surprised

Do let us know how you get on (if you get time - love your FT 'handle').

Prospero

This video report has been moved to the Trip Reports forum at the author's request.

Prospero
Moderator: BA forum

NTA

Thanks Prospero you :-:

themapelligroup

Very nice and honest TR. Thanks for sharing.